Because every movie franchise needs tiny, squeaking, adorable critters in pursuit of that Minion money, we’re likely going to see flying furby gremlins in Star Wars: Episode 8.
Multiple sources working on Star Wars: Episode 8 have told Making Star Wars that Luke Skywalker shares his Ahch-To island with flying creatures modeled after the real-world puffins inhabiting shooting location Skellig Michael. The creatures are reportedly “a mixture of the terrifying and the adorable.” It’s rumored these flying gremlins will have a surprisingly large role in the movie, with the bird creatures interacting with both Luke and Rey.
And now it looks like we may have already seen these new alien beasties. Redditor shine_o pulled several shots from Star Wars: The Force Awakens that suggest the avian protectors of Ahch-To have been part of the plan for years:
The bird creatures featured in VIII can be seen/heard in the background at the end of TFA from StarWarsLeaks
So what’s the big deal with these birds beyond their potential plushiness and marketability?
One possible answer stacks one mystery atop another. Several outlets have theorized that the little aliens are actually convorees, a species of bird that has appeared in Star Wars: The Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels.
While they’re exact nature is unclear, they seem to have a raw connection to the Force. Speaking to IGN, Rebels and Clone Wars co-creator Dave Filoni gave some cryptic hints regarding their spiritual nature:
“It’s not accidental that it’s there, and it’s not accidental that it’s bizarrely on this completely different world at the end of that episode. It definitely has a meaning for me, as the storyteller. It’s a subtle thing that if you know what the owl represents, then it deepens the lore of the whole thing and you go, ‘Okay, there are things at work here that are beyond our reckoning.’ In some ways, I could say that it’s a messenger, it’s an observer. It is definitely something.”
While we don’t know for sure that the rumored Star Wars: Episode 8 critters are convorees, it seems like the best-fit explanation. As slight and derivative as The Force Awakens may have turned out, new clues continue to suggest that Lucasfilm is quietly building a Star Wars mythology for those hardcore subsets of the fanbase still upset about the loss of the Star Wars expanded universe. Hopefully these mysterious birds turn out to be much more than just must-have toys this Christmas.
